Long list of broken promises

TAKE the Aboriginal "welcome to country" out of the Gillard Government's first 100 days in office and voters are left with little beyond broken promises and dodgy claims. Even the "welcome to country" looks a little dubious given the lack of any real progress to break the cycle of welfare that saps the will of many Aboriginal Australians. Further, Prime Minister Julia Gillard's humdrum words were reckoned to be overshadowed by the thoughtful address made by Opposition Leader Tony Abbott - by her critics from her own side of the House - so the new Parliament hardly began on a sparkling note. Indeed, it only got worse and worse. One of the major promises made by Gillard and by her deputy, Treasurer Wayne Swan, during the dismal election campaign was a resounding pledge to not introduce a carbon tax. Gillard was insistent that was her position, while Swan said claims that Labor would introduce a carbon tax were "hysterical". Abbott also pledged that the Coalition would not introduce a carbon tax. Only he looks like keeping his promise. The Australian public voted overwhelmingly for the two major parties. According to the Australian Electoral Commission, just under 78 per cent of those who voted gave their votes to Labor (37.99 per cent) or the Coalition (39.58 per cent). They voted for parties which promised not to introduce a carbon tax. Gillard has now, at her peril, turned her back on a large number of those who voted for her. She has done this to woo the Greens - who will hold a substantial number of votes in the Senate after July 1 - and to lure the Independents, Andrew Wilkie, Rob Oakeshott and Tony Windsor to her corner. Like the disastrous Emissions Trading Scheme, which she urged her predecessor Kevin Rudd to dump after the failure of the Copenhagen Conference, the carbon tax is all but dead in the countries that have adopted one, with the price of carbon plummeting. Gillard's proposal to set up a committee of MPs and private individuals who must all agree with the Government on the need for some form of a carbon tax is a silly a stunt just like her earlier plan to appoint a committee of citizens to advise her on climate change. Pushing ahead with this restricted group now - even as one of the world's leading scientific bodies reports that gaps in scientific knowledge about climate change make it impossible to accurately predict the extent of possible changes and consequences such as rises in sea levels - is an exercise in sheer futility. It may be a sop to a handful of Australians who voted for the Greens or Independents, but their numbers are insignificant in the whole, albeit crucial to Labor's hold on power. In embracing the few and ignoring the bulk of her support base, Gillard has spat in the eye of those who voted for her platform. There is an oft-quoted dictum in US politics which says you "dance with the one that brung you". Gillard has dumped those who voted for her party and risks alienating them with her newfound infatuation for things regional. So heavily indebted is she to the cowboy clowns she is even reneging on her promise to fix urban hospitals and prioritise a minor renovation of Hobart's crumbling hospital by targeting regional health for the speediest fix. In doing so, she is poking a very sharp stick in the eye of those in western Sydney and western Melbourne who were foolish enough to believe her promises to make their decaying health infrastructure the priority of her new Government. With nothing to show for its 100 days in power, Labor has fallen back on its pre-election spin that Abbott is a wrecker for failing to fall into line with its pitiful agenda. The reality is that Abbott has stayed true to his election promises - and had Labor stayed true to the policies it campaigned on - there may have actually been some consensus. The position Abbott has stuck to in Opposition is no less than the position Gillard once claimed for her own when she was in Opposition - that is the right to oppose. "The nature of our democracy is that the wheel turns and times change and who is the party of government and who is the party of opposition changes over time," she lectured the House in March, 2005. "One thing should never change and should be shared by everybody in this place is a commitment across parliament - whether in government or in opposition, whether in a governing party or in an opposition party, or indeed whether an Independent - and an understanding of the vital role that the parliament plays in holding the government to account. One of the foundation stones of our system of democracy is that this parliament can hold the Government to account". She continued: "That is not just a statement about the nature of being in opposition, though I think there is a special burden placed on members of the opposition because of course, at the end of the day, it is our job to hold the Government to account and to join the government in the public policy debate." But though she was then a supporter of "enabling an opposition to play the role that it must play in our parliamentary system: holding the government to account and providing scrutiny of the bills that the government brings before this parliament," that is not her position today. The wheel has turned and Gillard has shown she is unhappy with the result. She leads a fractured Government still riven with division over the nature of her own appointment as leader, a Government still saddled with failed Cabinet members and lacking the numbers to take decisive action internally or provide positive leadership for the nation. Gillard's willingness to dump key portions of her election promises in order to appease a handful of unrepresentative MPs is not a sound basis upon which to seek the trust of the people. It is a deceit, and deception is not a good foundation for open, honest leadership.